1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an in-vivo information display device, an in-vivo information display system, and an in-vivo information display method. More particularly, the invention relates to an in-vivo information display device, an in-vivo information display system, and an in-vivo information display method, by which in-vivo information acquired by a body-insertable device introduced into a subject can be displayed to a user in substantially real time.
2. Description of the Related Art
A conventional system is well known in which a receiving device placed outside a subject such as a living body receives image data acquired by a body-insertable device introduced into the subject and a display device connected to the receiving device via a predetermined line displays the image data in real time. Such a system is known as disclosed in, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2007-75164. In this conventional system, an image signal and a synchronizing signal are transmitted from the receiving device to the display device. The display device displays an intra-subject image acquired by a capsule-shaped body-insertable device to a user in substantially real time by displaying the received image signal in synchronization with the synchronizing signal.
In recent years, with the advance of information processing technology, it has been requested to display an image acquired by the body-insertable device by using an device, such as a personal computer, which has high general versatility and display function. It is normal to use an interface technology having high versatility such as a universal serial bus (USB) interface for the connection between an information processing device such as a personal computer and the receiving device.
When the information processing device is connected to the receiving device, the information processing device is the main device (master) and the receiving device is the sub device (slave) in terms of the connection relation between them. Therefore, when the information processing device acquires image data from the receiving device, it is required that the information processing device (master) requests the receiving device (slave) to transmit the image data and the receiving device transmits the image data to the information processing device in response to the request. This is referred to as a pull-type communication protocol.